Not for everyone, for sure, QUICHOTTE [pronounced key-shot] fluctuates between satire
and magical realism, and within the blueprint of Cervantes’ Don Quixote mixed with Moby Dick, Pinocchio and a smattering of mythology. You will enjoy the references and the parody.
Between
the Gods and mortal men and women, there hung a veil, and its name was maya.
The truth was the fabled world of the gods was the real one, while the
supposedly actual world inhabited by human beings was an illusion, and maya,
the veil of illusion, was the magic by which the gods persuaded men and women
that their illusory world was real.
A lost soul turned dreamer searches
for his idealized beloved. A companion, in the form of an imagined child, comes
to life. An opportunistic businessman tramples ethics. An adoring wife hopes to
secure the family legacy with philanthropy [think Sacklers.] A Bollywood actress
turned talk show host struggles under the weight of celebrity [and fentanyl.] And,
a high-profile advocate pedals integrity to the apathetic.
She
was a privileged woman complaining about small things. A woman whose life was
lived on the surface, who had chosen superficiality, had no right to complain
about the absence of depth. Human life was lived between two chasms, a Russian
writer had said, the one that preceded our birth, “the cradle rocks above an
abyss,” and the one we were all “heading for, at some forty-five hundred
heartbeats an hour].”
Brown
[Indian mostly] confronting white [white supremacists mostly] and all in fear
of the “other.” Sound familiar?
Yes, it’s a
mixed-up story, often humorous, sometimes maddening, and with an often confusing set
of characters – multiple characters with multiple names on parallel but intersecting paths. Rushdie is also sketching a tale of what-ifs and false narratives.
And, for good measure, includes sexually damaged women and sexually mutable
men. No stone unturned here.
Rushdie, no
stranger to pointing the finger at evil-doers [once subject to a fatwa by
Iranian religious leaders] seems to have decided to go after all the quirks of
Western civilization, most notably capitalism and pop-culture, aided and
abetted by. 24/7 TV. He also cites Zen and
the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and The
Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, books favored by wanderers.
It was bewildering at such an advanced age
to understand that the narrative of your family which you had carried within
you – within which, in a way, you had lived – was false, or, at the very least,
that you had been ignorant of its most essential truth, which had been kept
from you. Not to be told the whole truth, as Sister with her legal expertise
would know perfectly well, was to be told a lie.
Frankly, I
loved reading this novel. I looked forward to a block of time to immerse myself
in his ingenuity – one must read for prolonged periods of time or get totally
lost. I laughed. I cringed at painful truths. I marveled at his command of
language and history. On the other hand, Rushdie once too often goes off the
rails – rambling beyond a willing suspension of disbelief – and I agree with
the critics who suggest he reign in pontification for the sake of storytelling.
Perhaps Rushdie created in this novel his own impossible dream, where fictional characters bring
out the best in each other, battle windmills and redeem themselves of their
sins, although along the way, they create messes for the unsuspecting, or the opportunistic, to deal with.
Read at
your own risk. If nothing else, Quichotte is exquisitely crafted and unforgettable.
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